Distorted Perceptions
by Scraggles
Summary: A collection of Lightning-centric snippets ranging from pre-game, post-game, AU, and beyond, with themes from mild romance, to friendship and family. Some are excerpts from in progress work, others, unfinished oneshots. T to be safe. Mild & implied yuri.


Hi all. The going thing seems to be drabbles these days, so I gathered a few pieces of my Light-centric unfinished works and excerpts from things I'm working on. Hope you all like!

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**001. Fear**

Of all the things in the world, no one would ever have expected Lightning Farron to be afraid. Yet here she stood, shaking in her own proverbial boots at the sight of what lay before her, and at her own harsh words: "This is goodbye."

Sazh was right; she did want to stay, but logic would not permit her to do so. Unlike Snow, she had more sense than to do that; though, it didn't make it any less painful to admit. Serah was gone - gone forever, and for the second time in her life, Lightning was faced with something she had no way of controlling.

**002. Guilt**

How it burned, not being able to do anything. How she despised her own weaknesses, bringing the others down. How she felt that she couldn't trust him, when in the end, it was him that kept them going in the right direction. She had treated him badly. She had treated them all badly - her too, _Vanille_ - when none of them had deserved it, even Fang. They did what they had to do. She knew this, and it felt terrible. Why had she pushed them away?

**003. Scorn**

Cocoon. Fang was right - a floating nest of vipers, vipers that hated what they did not understand and visages that could not be understood. It had taken this ordeal to make her see it, too. Hate, hate, and more hate.. That was all that remained between the l'Cie and those of Cocoon.

**004. Loss**

Loss was all that she knew, now that she and the others had been branded. Losing her life, her friends, her family - Serah - that was true pain, and here she was faced with still more of this burning, searing, empty-letting, horrible anguish. The flames of battle were all that had not been lost to her, and she clung to them with greased, sweaty fingertips, hungry hands and melting flesh, weathering the fires of war that she might gain it all again.

**005. Discovery**

So this was what the explorers must have felt, she mused. _Discovery, _the act of finding something new; spying just a hint of bare peach from the base of the fruits she held captive with her hands, now Lightning had just a taste of how it had to have been for the pioneers who first discovered the whole of Cocoon in the tales of old.

**006. Acquaintance**

Here she was, the fruit, swaying in front of her, and no part of the soldier was not intrigued with the child, the small girl, an inane representation of a full conscience, manifesting itself before her. An odd one, the girl was, having met her no more than a few hours ago and being just as amicable as if she had known her for years. Infuriating too, this fleeting little insignificance was, but why her behavior did not incite rage in the woman, Lightning did not know. Gorgeous in every sense of the word, both of them knew they were, and unreal as the stars in the sky.

**007. Flight (****excerpt**** from Unintended)**

As cheap as it had seemed, soaring with the stars at night had to have been one of the best feelings she'd ever experienced, and as much as she hated to admit, one that she had shared with Fang, and solely Fang, and not of her own volition. The breeze against her cheeks, high above the mountain peaks, it blew her away, far above the back of Bahamut where she'd sat, and into the sky. The clouds lay below them, weeping, almost as if woefully jealous of their immense height together, she, the dragon, and Fang. The unbreakable clarity of the winds left her near deaf with disbelief, and she found tears pricking the corners of her eyes as she sat with the woman, who, to her surprise, found the same, and smiled.

**008. Rescue **

The plan – it was flawed, botched, bedraggled, heated, hateful, hot, and everything she could have imagined, but the outcome was everything that she could not. Staring her damsel in distress in the face and watching her turn to a pillar of crystal had not been how she had envisioned their great escape and ride off into the sunset as sisters, perhaps more, or her fool-making of Snow and abscondance with Serah such as like in the tales of Link and Zelda. Moreover, it had been what had broken her view of the world until they'd met again. Yet now, the rescue of her sister, Serah, had given rise to a new search for vengeance and fulfillment – finding Fang and Vanille again at last.

**009. Escape **

Fear of the inevitable, change, that was what she had – an incessant aversion to inconsistencies, instabilities. Since her parents had died, this was all that she knew. Serah was all that she had, and even now, some block-head was plotting to take her away too. A grimace. She had to leave; she needed to get away, to find some sort of reprieve from this maddening half-sleep of a life she lived, digging day in and day out into a dead end job that offered little opportunity to experience the one she so enjoyed the company of.

**010. Ownership (****excerpt**** from Art of the Upskirt)**

The question of possession in the group was doubtlessly the most debatable thing about their relationship. The beds were Vanille's, the food was Fang's, the toys were Snow's, and the weapons were swiftly and inexplicably hidden from Lightning at all times, specifically when Snow was making a fool of himself.

**011. Familiarity (****excerpt**** from Rainbows of Remembrance)**

As social of a butterfly as a twenty-three year old Lightning was, which she wasn't, never in all her years had she expected to happen upon this upon waking. There, in her lap lay a breakfast tray, empty of all its contents, which had taken the liberty of spilling onto the bedsheets and attaching themselves to various areas of her body. The sweet, bitter scent of partly soured milk filled the air and stuck to her arms, face and chest as she sat up in her delirium, wondering what day it was, and for that matter, where _she_ was. Looking over to the clock, she realized, that it was a Tuesday; she was in her home, and it was early, just barely past six. Drowsily, she pushed the tray to the floor.

"Lightning?" she heard a call from the hallway, and footsteps down the hall, the door opening, "Did you finish your breakfa-" The speech was cut off with a gasp before the man hastily began explaining. "Er.. I was just gone for five minutes, I promise!" He said, backing away.

Lightning furrowed her brow, trying to make the connection between the french toast in her shirt and the man babbling in front of her. "I didn't say anything," she mumbled, questioning his behavior.

"Er, right." He gulped, "Serah, Vanille, clean up on aisle five!"

And it was at that particular moment that Lightning began wondering just how familiar with the oaf she'd gotten in the past few years.

**012. Sprint**

Of all the things in the world, running about Pulse, she found satisfying.

**013. Matching (AU)**

It was odd, watching these two girls, frolicking in the sands together. Skirts and boots in kind, they danced about by the waves, enjoying each other's company. She furrowed a brow at their playful chatter and contagious laughter, looking over to Fang, who too was watching them in her strange manner of attire. As out of place as they were here in this society, she in her stately uniform and Fang in her tribal dress, she had to admit, staring on, that all in all, they were nothing less than matching mirrors, each viewing a reflection of the other.

**014. Condescendence**

There were many things beneath this great, seemingly unshakable woman, and fools were just a few of them.

**015. Naivete (AU prompt of WIP!fic)**

Disbelief and naivete - Lightning had no idea of just how far one person could push such things until she had experienced this for herself. A church girl, the stern accountant had noted with nothing short of distaste, as the veiled blur of peach and pink had come to her, bouncing and twirling as she leaped about in defiance of all that was reasonably sane.

"Here for your tax returns?" she droned flatly in her constricting pantsuit, eyes rolling behind shuttered lids as she added condescendingly, "You realize I can't do those in a grocery store, right?"

To her surprise, the girl hummed cheerily from her own eccentric, child-like ensemble, circling round, "Mhmm." She chirped, "Of course I do; I came to see you, after all." With that sickeningly sweet smile, Lightning could almost feel her lunch, literally consumed minutes ago, beginning to boil up in the pit of her stomach as the girl came beside her.

"What?" she stammered, mouth gaping unbecomingly as the girl began to explain, dropping her bags into the cart with Lightning's.

"Oh, well," she chirped, "Serah said you needed a friend, so here I am for the exploiting!" She gave a teasing look, as if chiding Lightning for the implications the woman was quite obviously wanting to believe at that statement, and smiled, linking arms with her and taking the cart in tow. She urged, "Come on, let's go!"

Startled, Lightning was only able to manage a redundant, incredulous, "You know my sister?" as she was pulled on. The response was a giggle and a nod, leaving her to be dragged away into the critical stares of other customers.

**016. Innocence **

Watching the fruit sleeping in their bundle of blankets next to her, breathing softly, there was no doubt in her mind, the girl was the most innocent thing she'd ever seen.

**017. Corruption**

One of the three simple truths, Lightning realized, about Cocoon was that nothing was as it should have been. The flowers, in their twisted, perfect shades of beauty, were fake; the seas, synthetic. All that was said was never done. The propaganda, it all covered a miraculous ruse. So, as she boarded the Purge train, Lightning knew what to expect.

**018. Mother**

What had pained her most had been her first realization. To Hope, she knew, as hard as she could try, nothing would permit her to ever close the hole in the boy's heart. No amount of effort or change could ever allow her to fulfill his expectations, or replace what he had lost. Try as she might, so long as she journeyed with him, she could be his sister, nay, more, but never, ever, could she become his mother.

**019. Stupidity**

Imbecilic, that was what that idiot was. Snow, the moron, had never ceased to surprise her in his arbitrary abhorrence to all that was intelligent. That in itself, of course, he was proving at the very moment, he and Sazh taking turns provoking the dueling pair of behemoth and megistotherian just short of the short cliff at which they all stood.

**020. Guts **

"I'll protect Serah, and Cocoon."

With words like that, he had to have a lot of them.

**021. Bliss**

A soft brush against her lips. Lightning's eyes fluttered open to be met with a whirl of color and a world of beauty as she sprawled out into whatever softness she was pressed between. The vaguest hint of citrus was all that separated her from reality as they parted.

**022. Fantasy (****excerpt**** from Unintended)**

"You can't live on nothing and expect to last forever," Fang had said, watching the soldier's form and its silhouette against the stone wall. Torrents of unrelenting rain made themselves seen and heard at the mouth of the cave, pounding against the steppe below. Lightning frowned.

"You can't live on everything and expect it to last for long either," she spat coldly, shaking as she wrung out her wet locks. Vanille sat in a hunch behind her, watching with a worried stare.

Fang sighed, giving up on that conversation entirely and changing the subject. "Why won't you let us help you?" she asked, running her hands through her hair. She wasn't surprised by the glare she received from this.

Now the sigh was Lightning's. She grunted, slipping off a soaking boot and tossing it at the wall. A crumpled, white woolen sock clung to her pale skin afterward, water droplets shining along her shin as the second skin was too was peeled away. The same was repeated with the other leg. Now clad in black shorts and bra alone, back turned to the others, she spoke grimly. "I don't need your help," she grumbled, huddling up to herself away from the fire.

"Lightning." Vanille exhaled, looking between the two. The woman's frustrated glance backward was enough to catch the forlorn look on the redhead's face, and yet, the girl did not notice this. She went on quietly, carefully, "If only you weren't living in your own little fantasies."

**023. Time (excerpt from Unintended, chronological companion to 022. Fantasy)**

Snow, that dense fool - she'd hated him for the longest while - him and his ridiculous insecurities, insufferable hero complex, everything. Yet now, staring at this once bumbling idiot as he slept, creamy flesh just barely peeking from behind the pendant around his neck and his irritating plethora of shirts in the night air, it was hard to believe just how far away that while was. However annoying and horrible he may have been, somewhere, somehow, that point in her life had come and gone. Snow was endearing, in his own admittedly strange ways. He was one of a kind, courageous, strong, and as much as she hated to admit, lovable - a joy to be around. This, Lightning hated to divulge, even to herself; it had taken all of this time for her to realize. How long had it really been?

Days? Weeks? Months? No, Snow had been with Serah longer than that, whether either of them realized it or not, and as a result, public enemy number one in Lightning's eyes, or rather, Claire's; that was her name, years and years ago, when Serah would come home from school babbling about her big, new best friend who would take on the world just to see her smile, and it had hurt. Especially, it hurt, the time she'd brought him home, years later, and Lightning had had the undeniable fear of losing her. She'd thought that had been her reason for hating him - fear of loss, but no, she was wrong. Jealousy, she realized. That was her motive. She just could not take the idea of anyone, especially one as block-headed as him, taking her sister's attention away from her. Had it taken this ordeal to make her see it? This time?

**024. Compromise**

"What?"

"Compromise," Fang repeated, amused. She went on, "You know, coming to terms by sacrificing a little something on both sides?"

Lightning huffed, "Never heard of it."

**025. Finality**

Sitting at the breakfast table, eating her mush, she knew there was nothing she could say or do when Serah came marching in, saying, "Lightning, it's your birthday and there's absolutely no way I'm letting you out of this house without celebrating it with me, got it?"

And so, not so willfully, she nodded. Serah, whether she knew it or not, had always worn the pants in the family.


End file.
